Leaps and bounds…2 months later
Hey everyone!
Welcome back this Tuesday for our weekly Xeva update (which I’ve been slacking on a little bit, but I’ll be working on staying on top of this one a bit better in the coming weeks). We had an awesome training this week and got to see a cuddly group of 9 week old puppies on our way!
Group class for the Advance Obedience (CGC) ended last week. While we didn’t take the test, it was a good class for her to get involved in. We weren’t quite to the stage that we were comfortable in taking part in the test since Miss Xeva is still working on forward progress, but one day, we’ll get there.
After thinking about how long we’ve been doing steady, active work towards working her through this, we realized it has only been just over two months in total. Since then, she has improved in leaps and bounds. No longer does she bark and lunge/shy away from every dog and person that she sees. She is learning to calmly look at them and then to look away- usually to me. This has become a common reaction for her now, but it took so much work to get to this point and we still have a long way to go.
Anyways, with that class over, we had our class for tonight canceled so we headed out to do some training on our own. We detoured at a breeder/dog shower friend’s house and saw her adorable litter of puppies.
This little black tri girl was a heart stealer and is promised to the co-owner of the litter.
Xeva waited patiently in the car and didn’t bark at the puppy or at the big Mastiff puppy that she has there with her as well, even though we were nearby the car while we talked with our friend. She barked once when Tori- the Mastiff mom- barked at us, but quieted down after a moment. Other than that, she was quiet.
Puppy cuddles done, we headed into Old Town and wandered around for half an hour or so, walking on the boardwalk, walking around the town, walking near the playground where all the kids were, etc. She did awesome. Not a bark, not a peep.
We haven’t done much ‘outside’ work from class, working mostly indoors since the environment is easier to control in those situations. We decided tonight that it would be good to start seeing how she does in a less controlled environment and are proud to report that she did stellar tonight, especially compared to how she was back in March.
These kind of nights give me the hope that we can pull her through this with steady dedication and consistency. She had a blast tonight working with me and being exposed to her first real outside training experience, so we may have to add that into the rotation and keep working on getting her used to the variety of experiences that the outside world has to offer her. A shout out goes to my wonderful mother for being willing to be our treat holder and picture taker for the night 🙂
Prepping to do a Rally turn.
Paws up!
Those scary gratings and metal pads were no match for this brave girl tonight!
Thanks for dropping by for our update! Hopefully you all have wonderful nights and will be back to take part in our Wordless Wednesday post for tomorrow 🙂 I’m not sure what we have lined up for it yet, but that’s just part of the fun, right? Don’t forget to scroll over to that sidebar and click on the FreeKibble banner!
~ Anastasia and Miss Xeva
The Love of a Dog 